Plans for the first contact between North Korea and the United States after President Donald Trump took office were canceled after the U.S. State Department denied a visa for the top envoy from Pyongyang, the Wall Street Journal has reported.

The talks, between senior North Korean Foreign Ministry envoy Choe Son Hui and former U.S. officials, were scheduled to take place on March 1 and 2 in New York but were called off after Choe was denied a visa, the Journal said Saturday.

It was not clear what led the State Department to deny the visa but North Korea's test-firing of a ballistic missile on Feb. 12 and the murder of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's half brother in Malaysia may have played a role, the report said.